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Online Behavioral Research

Time and place: 26-29 April 2027 (4 days); Hanken School of Economics

Learning goal and objectives: The Internet is revolutionizing how empirical research is conducted across the social sciences. Without intermediaries, individual researchers can conduct large-scale experiments with human participants, run A/B tests on online platforms, and collect large datasets via web scraping. In this course, students will learn how to harness these opportunities while avoiding the many pitfalls of online research. The course is tailored for researchers in business, psychology, economics, and any other area of academia who investigate human behavior. We build an understanding of how to conduct “lab” experiments on different online panels, including techniques to maximize the validity and reproducibility of research findings. We will also discuss how to unlock the potential of the Internet for more elaborate, richer designs that go beyond simple survey experiments (e.g., web scraping, A/B tests, social media simulation software). Importantly, technical and practical insights will explicitly serve the goal of improving the rigor and publishability of participants’ own research. To this end, we will include discussions on whether and how to combine online and offline investigations, how to preregister and report online research in a paper, and more. The course relies on a mix of discussions, demonstrations, and exercises that use participants’ own research needs and projects as starting points. At the end of the course, participants will be fully equipped to design, execute, and report valid online research for their own investigations.

Instruction and examination: The course is built on prior reading of recent articles, tutorials, and empirical applications of crowdsourcing, web scraping, A/B tests, social media simulation software and hands-on work on class examples from these areas.

The course will cover four main units:

  • An Introduction to online behavioral research methods
  • A primer on crowdsourcing platforms (e.g., Prolific) for online survey-based experiments
  • Web scraping and application programming interfaces
  • Online platform studies and social media simulation software

The course involves theory sessions, hands-on examples guide (carried out in parallel with the student), individual applications, and post-discussion/consultation. The course will be helpful for doctoral students’ decision-making concerning study design, data collection, measurement, and manuscript positioning.

Credits: 4 ECTS

Grading: The course will be graded as Pass or Fail. There will be an individual project carried out throughout the course.

Prerequisites: A basic understanding of experimental design and statistical knowledge is helpful, but not mandatory.

Admittance:

  • 25 students are admitted to the course.
  • Application guidelines: students in all fields of business and economics studies, (e.g., in marketing, organizational behavior, management, etc.). As most of the literature and examples relate to marketing and management, priority will be given to doctoral students who are majoring in those disciplines. Participants can apply by sending their CV and a motivation letter to Robert Ciuchita (robert.ciuchita@hanken.fi).
  • Last application date: January 29th, 2027
  • Notification of acceptance: February 5th, 2027

Instructor:

Johannes Boegershausen, Associate Professor of Marketing, Erasmus University Rotterdam

https://www.rsm.nl/people/johannes-boegershausen/

Johannes Boegershausen is an Associate Professor of Marketing at the Rotterdam School of Management (RSM) at Erasmus University. Johannes’ research examines marketplace morality, stigma, and well-being. He also develops frameworks to improve online data collection methods, such as web scraping and online platform studies. His research has been published in leading journals such as the Journal of Marketing, Journal of Consumer Research, Journal of Consumer Psychology, and Journal of Personality and Social Psychology. He has received grants from various organizations, including the Marketing Science Institute (MSI) and Accessibility Standards Canada. Johannes was named a 2025 MSI Young Scholar and received the 2019 C.W. Park Young Contributor Award from the Society for Consumer Psychology. In 2023, he was recognized as one of the Poets & Quants’ Top 50 Undergraduate Professors. He serves on the editorial review board of the Journal of Marketing and the International Journal of Research in Marketing. Johannes holds a Ph.D. in Marketing from the University of British Columbia, Canada. Before joining Erasmus, he worked as an Assistant Professor of Marketing at the University of Amsterdam.

Course coordinator and contact information:

Robert Ciuchita, Associate Professor, Department of Marketing, Hanken School of Economics (https://harisportal.hanken.fi/en/persons/robert-ciuchita)

Dr. Robert Ciuchita (Ph.D. in Marketing from Maastricht University) is an Associate Professor of Marketing at Hanken School of Economics (Finland). His research and teaching interests lie in the areas of service management, service innovation, digital marketing, and customer experience management. His research has appeared in, for example, the Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science, Journal of Service Research, Journal of Interactive Marketing, Journal of Business Research, Journal of Service Management, and Journal of the Association for Consumer Research. He currently serves as an associate editor for the Journal of Business Research and the Journal of Service Management and on the editorial review boards of the Journal of Service Research, Journal of Interactive Marketing, and Industrial Marketing Management.